The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; On Human Nature eBook

As regards morality, example, like doctrine, may,
it is true, promote civil or legal amelioration, but
not that inward amendment which is, strictly speaking,
the only kind of moral amelioration. For example
always works as a personal motive alone, and assumes,
therefore, that a man is susceptible to this sort
of motive. But it is just the predominating sensitiveness
of a character to this or that sort of motive that
determines whether its morality is true and real; though,
of whatever kind it is, it is always innate. In
general it may be said that example operates as a
means of promoting the good and the bad qualities
of a character, but it does not create them; and so
it is that Seneca’s maxim, velle non discitur—­will
cannot be learned—­also holds good here.
But the innateness of all truly moral qualities, of
the good as of the bad, is a doctrine that consorts
better with the metempsychosis of the Brahmins and
Buddhists, according to which a man’s good and
bad deeds follow him from one existence to another
like his shadow, than with Judaism. For Judaism
requires a man to come into the world as a moral blank,
so that, in virtue of an inconceivable free will,
directed to objects which are neither to be sought
nor avoided—­liberum arbitrium indifferentiae—­and
consequently as the result of reasoned consideration,
he may choose whether he is to be an angel or a devil,
or anything else that may lie between the two.
Though I am well aware what the Jewish scheme is,
I pay no attention to it; for my standard is truth.
I am no professor of philosophy, and therefore I do
not find my vocation in establishing the fundamental
ideas of Judaism at any cost, even though they for
ever bar the way to all and every kind of philosophical
knowledge. Liberum arbitrium indifferentiae
under the name of moral freedom is a charming
doll for professors of philosophy to dandle; and we
must leave it to those intelligent, honourable and
upright gentlemen.

CHARACTER.

Men who aspire to a happy, a brilliant and a long
life, instead of to a virtuous one, are like foolish
actors who want to be always having the great parts,—­the
parts that are marked by splendour and triumph.
They fail to see that the important thing is not what
or how much, but how they act.

Since a man does not alter, and his moral
character remains absolutely the same all through
his life; since he must play out the part which he
has received, without the least deviation from the
character; since neither experience, nor philosophy,
nor religion can effect any improvement in him, the
question arises, What is the meaning of life at all?
To what purpose is it played, this farce in which
everything that is essential is irrevocably fixed and
determined?